Pig in a Poke
by Chiiyo86
Summary: Sam thought his only worry in the world was being Lucifer’s true vessel and having triggered the Apocalypse. Then he and his brother got swine flu.


A/N: Written for the Dean-focused hurt/comfort fic challenge on hoodie_time, in answer to ariadnes_string's prompt: "Dean (and maybe Sam too) picks up H1N1 somewhere (school kids, maybe). After a few days, he's not deathly ill anymore, though still miserable (maybe they both are), and he's determined to soldier on. But Sam's all about following the recommended guidelines--ie, staying in voluntary isolation until 24 hours after the fever lifts. Why make the apocalypse worse by spreading swine flu, right? So, they're stuck in a motel room somewhere (or maybe Bobby's), driving each other NUTS." My thanks to Wave Obscura for the beta work and for the title, and to ariadnes_string for the prompt!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything Supernatural related.

---

Sam thought his only worry in the world was being Lucifer's true vessel and having triggered the Apocalypse. Then he and his brother got swine flu. It was proof to him that he was the butt of some mean-spirited joke. Somewhere, someone was laughing their ass off. After four days of being sick as a dog, Sam was trying to think of a way he could make it all Dean's fault. In his head, just, you know, to make him feel better.

In echo to his thoughts, Sam heard Dean coughing. Then muttering half-intelligible curse, and blowing his nose noisily.

"Dean," Sam called in a warning voice.

"What?"

"Don't throw your tissue on the floor. It's disgusting."

He didn't have to turn to imagine the look on his brother's face.

"I wasn't going to."

"Yeah, right. And I'm the reincarnation of Ingrid Bergman."

"It does explain some things." Dean paused. "Why Ingrid Bergman?"

"It just… popped into my head." Sam rubbed his face wearily. He was going to have to get out of bed, he knew that. He couldn't use the excuse of being sick anymore. "_Casablanca_ was Jess's favorite movie." He didn't add that he'd been dreaming of Jess when his fever had been at its worst, for the first time in forever. Dreaming about blond hair and cookies, and fire that burned hotter than anything, reducing him to ashes.

"Oh. 'Kay," was Dean's quiet reply, before something soft hit Sam's head. Pillow. Sam groaned, batted his hand to push the offending object out of his bed.

"Dude, don't throw your germs at me."

"Why does it matter? We were both sick. My germs are your germs, a big happy family. Now get up, so we can hit the road."

"What?"

"Well, I feel better. You feel better. We don't have any reason to stay here. I'm sick of this shit hole. I want to see the sun and breathe the fresh air."

"Like you can breathe anything," Sam retorted.

Dean sniffed loudly, with a disgusting gurgling noise, and swallowed.

"Jesus, _Dean."_ Sam hid his face in pillow, and maybe if he managed to bury it deep enough he could forget that he was related to Dean.

"I can smell that you reek, brother. Get your ass in the shower and we leave."

Sam sat up in his bed to look at his brother. He must have been dozing at some point because Dean was dressed and his hair was wet from the shower. He still looked sick, though, his face pale, dark bruises under his red-rimmed eyes and his nose red and irritated. But he was gathering his scattered clothes and putting them in his duffle bag, all movement and determination to be _out._

"Where are you going like that?" Sam asked.

"I don't know. Breakfast. Somewhere. Out of here and back to the land of the living."

"Dean, you're not going out."

Dean stilled, holding a pair of jeans by one leg.

"And why's that?"

"Because," Sam pushed the covers, threw his legs out of the bed. "You – _we _– are still contagious. We're not going to give to some poor unsuspecting people the H1N1 virus. Not on top of…"

_Setting Lucifer free _was on the tip of his tongue, but he didn't say anything. Didn't dare to, not yet, because even if Dean had admitted they shared responsibility in this business, Sam wasn't sure he was ready to test saying it out loud. He still felt like the guilty one, still indebted to his brother.

Either Dean was oblivious to the unsaid words, or he decided not to comment on it. Instead, he rolled his eyes and exclaimed:

"Don't be dramatic! We didn't have swine flu. It was just… the flu."

"Swine flu is flu, Dean."

"Thank you, professor, I'm aware. You know what I mean. It was normal flu."

"I don't know. It was pretty bad. For one whole night I had to keep you from running after s 'bunnies.'" He raised his hands to make a quotation motion with his fingers around the word "bunnies."

Dean frowned, trying to remember, but Sam doubted anything would come back to him; he had been so out of it. Sam remembered, though, and it had not been pretty. He'd been dizzy and shivering with fever and he had to wrestle his brother into bed, sit with him until Dean finally stopped mumbling unrelated sentences in which only the word "bunny" was clear, and fell asleep. And this had been the funniest part of what the fever had done to his brother – but the rest, Sam didn't want to think about it. Definitely not an experience he wanted to repeat.

Dean interrupted his trip to memory lane by asking:

"But you had a fever too, right?"

"Um, yeah. You gave me the flu."

"No, _you…_ Never mind, my point is," Dean raised a pompous finger, and pointed it at Sam, "_you _could have been dreaming all this."

"I doubt it."

"I'm sure there was no bunny."

"Well, I'm sure of it too, but you were…"

"I never talked about bunnies."

Sam opened his mouth to contradict him, but changed his mind and let out a sigh. No need to fight about it, not when there was a more pressing matter. Know how to pick your battles and all that. He stood up, relishing in the stable feeling the world gave him when he moved, no tilting or swaying when he turned his head.

"Even if it's was only normal flu, we have no way to know for sure," he argued. "It doesn't hurt to be careful."

"So what do you say?"

"We stay here. For at least 24 hours, just to be safe."

Dean blinked owlishly. He still really looked sick, like he belonged to a bed.

"What? No!" he finally blurted. "Sam, if I stay _one _morehour, I'll go crazy. I swear, if we stay here, you're gonna regret it."

Sam's eyes narrowed.

"Is it a threat?"

"Just fact, Sammy. Just a fact." He grabbed his duffle. "I'm gonna put that in the trunk. You go shower."

"No."

Sam took a few steps and placed himself in front of the door, arms folded on his chest. _You. Shall. Not. Pass._

"Oh, now you're being ridiculous," Dean groaned. "Get out of the way or I'll kick your ass."

"Go ahead." Sam raised his chin mutinously. "I _dare_ you."

Dean tried to shove Sam out of his way, but Sam wouldn't budge, so Dean put his bag on the floor so he could use both hands. Sam was ready for him – when Dean tried to hold him by the shoulders, Sam viciously twisted his brother's arm.

"Ow, you little shit!"

Dean managed to get out of Sam's grasp with a swift motion. He glared at Sam, and Sam glared at him, and they lunged at each other in one synchronized movement. They wrestled in a disorganized and ineffective flail of arms – they must look really stupid, Sam thought fleetingly – but after a few minutes they were already exhausted, bent in half trying to catch their breath. Sam straightened first, and gave his brother's shoulder a playful shove, grinning at what seemed like victory. Dean swayed, and Sam had to grab his elbow to keep him from falling.

"Hey, ho. Don't faint on me, bro."

Dean pushed him away, a little too weakly for Sam's peace of mind, and cast him an affronted look.

"I don't _faint._ Ever. And I feel perfectly fine," he said as he went to sit on his bed.

"Uh huh. I can see that. So we're staying?"

"Alright. We're staying, and saving the world from the spreading of a terrible virus."

Sam rolled his eyes.

"The world thanks you, Dean."

"You're a fucking smart ass, you know that?"

"Takes one to know one." Sam turned his back to his brother, walking to the bathroom. "I'm gonna take a shower."

"Thank _God_!"

As an answer, Sam slammed the bathroom door behind him. A few seconds, and he heard the muffled sounds of TV. He smirked to himself. They were definitely staying.

The room was small, but it felt good to be alone, even in the relative privacy of the bathroom. He threw a look at himself in the mirror above the sink, just in passing because he really looked like shit, just like his brother. He started to undress, and when he raised his arms to take his t-shirt off he got a whiff of his own smell. He winced.

"Ew."

His fingers went through his hair like a comb, and it felt greasy and his scalp itched. He needed to shower like, yesterday. Leaving his t-shirt and boxers rumpled on the floor, he stepped into the tub. The warming water felt good running on his skin, which had lost the hypersensitivity of the fever. He was shivering a little but it was just from the contact of the air with wet skin, nothing like the flu-induced chills that had shaken him for days as he was huddled under the covers. He closed his eyes, put his face under the spray. It felt _good_, soothing, in a way he had almost forgotten. The last few days he hadn't been strong enough to do more than sleep or lay in bed, occasionally getting up to take a leak or to heat some soup and try to eat. And to fight his delirious brother, of course.

He stayed in the shower more than he usually would, until there were no more hot water and he was trembling for real from the cold water. He blew his still running nose with toilet paper, winced because it was sensitive and peeling. He found a tiny towel to tie around his hips, and left the bathroom. His brother was lying on his bed, the remote control in his hand, and he was channel surfing, looking bored.

"Anything good?" Sam asked while he was rummaging around among his clothes to find something clean to wear.

"No. Daytime TV fucking sucks. I'm going to die of boredom and you'll have to dispose of my body."

Sam froze at the last words. His back was to his brother, but he heard him shift, making the bed creak.

"Sorry," Dean said quietly.

"It's okay." Sam slipped on jeans and a shirt, and cleared his throat. "Wanna play poker? To pass the time."

"Still high on your victory over this Patrick guy, little brother?"

"Hey, I saved your ass, man," Sam retorted. An irritated feeling was creeping over him, and he tried to quell it.

"Yeah, I know. Wish I could have seen that."

Sam turned, surprised at the wistful pride in his brother's voice. He saw Dean blush a little, straighten in his bed and glare at Sam, daring him to make any comment. Sam didn't, but he filed the moment in a corner of his brain for later examination.

"We playing or what?" he asked instead.

"We don't have any cards."

"Yes, we do, where is the…"

"We don't have it… anymore."

"What…"

"Don't ask."

"O-_kay._"

Weird, but Sam shrugged it off. He sat on his bed, back against the headboard, and stared at the television screen.

"Would have kicked your ass, though."

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever you say, Dean."

---

"I don't get it."

"What?"

"This."

Dean waved at the TV. After fighting over the remote control for a while, they'd agreed on a channel and had watched the end of some thriller movie. The room had been relatively silent for about twenty minutes, and Sam was starting to think that maybe they could spend the day like that, and maybe it could be quiet and relaxing and just what they needed before going back on the road, saving people, hunting shit.

"You'll have to be a little more specific, Dean. I don't read minds."

"Was there one or two guys involved? They never made that clear."

"There was one guy."

"You sure? What about the guy in the church?"

"It was the same guy."

"How do you know that? We didn't even see his face."

"We saw his eyes. Some of his nose. Believe me, it was the same guy."

"Hmm I don't know. The church guy's eyes looked dark. The other one's were blue."

"No, the guy in the church had blue eyes too."

"They were dark, brown or black. Definitely not blue."

Sam sighed. _Here we go._ He recognized the trend, knew where it was leading to, and he had felt so peaceful just one minute ago. But he knew he was right, this guy's eyes were blue, and if Dean would stop being so stubborn they could be done with this pointless conversation.

"His eyes were blue. I'm sure of it. I even remember thinking it: "His eyes are blue." Now can we…"

"No, no, they weren't blue. How can you be so sure anyway? This scene was dark."

"Then how can you be sure they weren't blue? Maybe the fact that it was dark made it _seem_ like this guy's eyes were dark. And anyway, it isn't just the color; it's also the shape of the eyes. I'm sure it was the same guy."

"Okay, maybe his eyes kinda looked the same, but they still didn't make that clear and the ending was so rushed…"

Apparently, there was no convincing his brother, and they weren't going to fight over some stupid movie.

"You're right, Dean," he said in his most reasonable tone. "They didn't make it clear, they suck, now if you could change the channel and see if there's anything else good to watch?"

But his most reasonable tone didn't quite do the trick.

"Don't do that, I hate it."

"Do what?" Sam hadn't been aware he was doing anything.

"Speak in that… fucking soothing voice like I'm being unreasonable and…"

He was being unreasonable, but Sam was wise enough not to point it out.

"What do you want me to say?"

"Well you could admit I have a point!"

"I just did that!"

"Yeah but you said it like you were _humoring _me."

"I just thought it was clear that it was the same guy without them needing to spell it out for us, but if you didn't see it then…"

"See! That's what I'm talking about! You make it sounds like I'm stupid because I didn't notice some guy's eye shape or eye color or whatever…"

"We're not going to fight over some stupid movie, are we? It wasn't even that good, nothing to get upset over."

"So now you admit that it wasn't a good movie!"

"Well…"

"It was exactly what I meant, it was stupid and the ending was sloppy and they didn't explain everything."

"Yeah, okay."

Sam didn't really like what felt like giving in, because he was still sure – pretty sure – about the guy in the church, but well, it was only one in the afternoon and if they wanted to make it through the day, something had to give one way or another. They were both tired and not feeling like themselves. And it was just a dumb fucking movie.

"I don't wanna watch TV anymore," he said. "Can we do something else?"

Dean was pressing the bridge of his nose between two fingers, like his head was hurting.

"Dean?"

"Yeah, uh, yeah." Dean cleared his throat. "Let's do something else."

---

"Okay, I have one."

"Fictional character?"

"Yeah."

"A man?"

"Yeah, a man."

"Does he have some special ability?"

"Define ability."

"Like, some supernatural power. You know what I mean."

"Yeah."

"Yeah, you know what I mean, or yeah to my question?"

"I know what you mean. What was your question again?"

"Dean, pay attention!"

"I am!"

"Come on, you can't remember a question I asked you five seconds ago!"

"Are you going to repeat your question or what? We can stop playing."

"Well I don't care. You're the one who wanted to play!"

He was annoyed and his voice was an octave too high, getting stuck in his throat so that what came out was an embarrassing squeak that made him cough. He rolled on his side and coughed in his cupped hand, his eyes tearing up and the muscles in his chest and back aching. When he was finished he raised his head to see his brother looking at him, half-amused, half-worried. Sam wiped his spit-wet palm on his jeans.

"You okay?" Dean asked.

"Yeah," Sam rasped.

"So, question?"

"Does your character have any supernatural abilities?"

"No."

"Does he fight crime?"

"Yeah."

"Does he live in Gotham City, is insanely rich, and have a butler named Alfred?"

"Fuck, Sam, you know you have to ask only one question at a time!"

"Then stop choosing Batman each time we play this game!"

"Batman is cool."

"So not my point. It's no fun if you choose the same characters over and over…"

"Well, this game stopped being fun when you were ten years old, so…"

Sam threw his hands in the air in a wide gesture of melodramatic annoyance.

"Then why the hell did you want us to play?"

---

They'd found notepaper headed with the name of the motel on it and had started making paper airplanes with it. The floor in front of their twin beds was strewn with plane-shaped sheets of paper that had gone there to die after their short-lived flights. Once dead, the airplanes weren't given another chance, and now they were almost out of paper.

Sam was kneeling on his bed, holding his plane between thumb and forefinger, and he was swinging his hand back and forth, trying to feel the air.

"It's not going to fly," Dean commented.

"Shut up."

"One side is smaller than the other."

"Dean, shut up."

"Both sides have to be of equal size for the plane to fly. Didn't I teach you anything?"

Sam pressed his lips together and said nothing. He actually knew that his brother was right – the airplane had been folded hastily and would never fly – but Dean had been winning their little competition so far, most of his planes flying better than his, and Sam had enough of his brother's patronizing, and he was just so goddamn _annoyed_, his every nerves frayed and raw, so much that even Dean coughing or sniffing was irritating.

Sam threw his plane, and it went down nose first, right on the bed. He let out a loud and pissed off sigh.

"Told you," Dean said, and that was it.

"Oh, shut the fuck up!" Sam shouted.

Dean opened his mouth in a surprised "o" like he was wondering what he had done wrong, and he raised his hand in a pacifying manner, the bastard.

"Wow, calm down, cowboy. What has your panties in a twist?"

"Oh, don't… You've been trying to get a rise out of me all day!"

"I'm what? You were the one who wanted us to stay here one more day! I agreed, we stayed and now you're throwing a hissy fit over some stupid paper airplanes?"

"It's not about the plane, I don't give a fuck about you winning some dumb competition!"

"So what's the problem?"

"It's you, you're so… so…" He made a frustrated, grabbing motion with his hand, trying to come up with the right word. He gritted his teeth, and the bubble of irritation was growing in his chest until it felt tight. Dean was staring at him, unblinking, and suddenly Sam couldn't stand it anymore. He slid from his bed and stormed in the bathroom.

"Oh, _come_ on! Don't be a drama queen!" Dean called in his back.

Sam slammed the bathroom door.

---

When he came out it was already dark, and the only light in the room was the soft glow of TV playing yellowish shadows on Dean's face. Sam threw a roll of toilet paper to his brother, who was sniffing miserably and wiping his nose with the back of his hand.

"Thanks," Dean said, but he kept his eyes on the TV screen.

Sam nodded and went to lie on his bed. On the screen he recognized Clint Eastwood, looking young and wearing a brown poncho and a cowboy hat, but he wasn't sure which of Sergio Leone's movies it was.

"Clint Eastwood looks fucking cool," Dean offered.

"He does," Sam admitted.

"You see, in this world there's two kinds of people, my friend. Those with loaded guns, and those who dig. You dig," Clint Eastwood said, and it came back to Sam. It was _The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly._

"We're both," Dean said out of the blue.

Sam glanced at him.

"What?"

"We're both. We have loaded guns, and we dig," Dean explained, and let a few seconds pass before he snorted a laugh at his own joke. "But Clint Eastwood probably never met any hunters."

"Yeah."

Dean resumed his movie watching, but Sam kept looking at his brother as he watched Clint Eastwood. Sam stifled a yawn – he was tired too, even though it was barely more than 10 pm, and he felt weird, detached and floating. He didn't know if it was because he was tired and still sick, because he had been cooped up for five days with his brother in the same motel room, but it was suddenly like everything in his life, the people he knew, the things he had seen and done, the threat of Lucifer lurking out there, even himself, was unreal and ready to dissolve with a gust of wind. It felt like the world had narrowed down to only Dean, sitting on his bed and watching TV, blinking rapidly, obviously fighting sleep like a five-year old who wanted to stay up past his bedtime, his mouth slightly open because he couldn't breathe through his nose, and looking so… _real_, unlike everything else. The only real thing.

Sam shifted on his bed, trying to shake off the awkward and uneasy feeling that kind of reminded him of when he was a teenager and had a growth spurt, when he didn't know what to do with all his arms and hands and legs and feet. Now it wasn't physical but he still didn't know how to handle the emotions swirling inside of him, elusive like smoke, both painful and warming. He thought about those moments during the four last days when Dean had yelled, cried, begged or laughed hysterically in his feverish sleep and Sam had just known he was dreaming about Hell, even though his mumbling made no sense that Sam could grasp, and even though Dean didn't dreamed as much about Hell now – or had become better at hiding it, maybe. It made the feelings inside draw more on the side of painful.

But then Dean laughed at the screen, and the world slammed back in place, abruptly. The movie was ending and Clint Eastwood was leaving the Mexican thieve whose name Sam couldn't remember in the desert and Dean was laughing, like he did every time he watched this movie, except this time it turned into a fit of coughing.

"It's karma," Sam chuckled. "Laughing at the unhappiness of others, you bad boy."

"Fuck… you," Dean panted, trying to catch his breath.

Sam laughed again and closed his eyes. He listened to his brother get up and go to the bathroom, to the water running and the gulping noise of Dean drinking. He was so tired his head was hurting a little, and he rubbed his forehead before turning on his side and curling in on himself.

"Dude," Dean said when he was back in the room. "Sleep under the covers."

"Mmh hmm."

He felt his brother pull up sheets and blankets around him, and smiled into his pillow.

"Good night," Dean said before turning off the TV.

"'Night, Dean."

Tomorrow, they were getting the hell out of here.


End file.
